Elton named for town in Middlesbrough, England
Jefferson Davis Parish, Louisiana
Submitted by Kathy LaCombe-Tell
Source; Jim Bradshaw Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser, 
Submitted June 2004
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm
************************************************The wife of pioneer settler J. M. Henderson is said to have chosen 
the name Elton for her home town from a book in which she read of 
an English town named Elton. That was probably the town on the north-
west coast of England in Durham County near Middlesbrough. 

Although Elton wasn't incorporated as a village until 1911, some 
of the oldest Jefferson Davis Parish families had settled there 
even before the Civil War. 

Probably the oldest was the Thomas Buller family, that came from 
St. Landry Parish around 1840 to settle among a grove of great 
oaks north of the present Missouri Pacific Railroad. The Bullers 
were descendants of Joseph Buller Sr., born in 1781 in Opelousas. 
He was the son of John Buhler, who was born in Germany. The name 
had been changed to Buller by the time Thomas reached adulthood. 
Thomas was born in 1808 in Opelousas and married there in 1831 to 
Emilie Brignac. 

Emile Buller, brother of Thomas, also moved to the Elton area some 
years later. He served in the Civil War and moved from Washington 
(La.) after the war, settling at a spot about a mile north of the 
town. He was married to Elizabeth Johnson. J. M. Henderson came 
from Des Moines, Iowa, in 1888 and started a store where he 
established the Elton post office about 1891. 

According to an old recollection, "There were three post 
offices on the route. Raymond was 10 miles north of Jennings; 
China was 15 miles north of Jennings; and Elton was 20 miles 
north of Jennings. The mail was carried on horseback twice 
a week. Later, the carrier used a two-wheeled gig and carried 
a passenger at one dollar when he could get one." 

The Marcantel family was also at Elton early on. The first of 
them in Louisiana was Joseph Vuillemont Marcanteli, who came 
from Italy. He'd settled near Washington in St. Landry Parish 
at least by 1770, when he was listed as a militiamen. His 
descendants came to Elton prior to the Civil War. 

The forerunner to the Missouri Pacific Railroad reached Elton in 
1905, putting the community on the map. At one time, the town 
boasted of having a college, a textile plant, five sawmills, two 
hotels, four major oil companies with producing wells, a concrete 
tile plants, and a patent medicine company. 

The Church of St. Paul at Elton had been served for may years 
as a mission by priests from Jennings. In 1913, it was raised 
to the rank of parish.